At its peak the tech industry was nearly dominated by hard working women, many who I consider key to how the industry evolved. Indeed without people like “Amazing Grace” IT would not be what it is today, the first person to see the potential of computing beyond being overgrown calculators. By the 80s though the comparatively healthy tech industry in general had suffered a major blow, with women amounting to around 34% of all workers, that ratio has wavered up and down ever since but is still the average across the tech industry.

Today the attitudes of the people on top drive away many talented individuals, it’s poisonous and stunting the growth of the industry. The roles of our peers in this is also to be seen in the promotion of CT like Gamergate, used to attack women in the IT industry and their supporters. We’ve got a serious issue of bigotry to overcome across the board, but I’ve seen no more toxic environment than modern IT.

I’m glad you’ve stuck with it, we need people like you more than we’ll ever need “brogrammers”.